In times less alien to a spirit mild,
In new-recover’d seats, the happier day....
Such for the future is my hope; meanwhile,
I rest'”
PRAYER
O Thou Most Holy One, within the vastness of Whose Overlife we live and move and have our being, Our God, Our Father’s God, the God of all whom we love in the Great Unseen, we turn to Thee in this hour because we need Thy reassurance, Thy calm consolation, Thine unfailing strength, and the benediction of Thy Peace.
O God, our hearts are full of anguish. For again among us Cæsar has conquered; armed violence has had its way; the armored car and the iron curtain their victory. The warrior has swept away the peacemaker—and the little Father, who loved all men, who walked with the humblest, who lifted up the lowliest, who trusted his enemies, who forgave those who tried to kill him, is gone.
Make us remember in this hour, O God, how we left him to fight alone for our peace—how we laid the chastisement of our peace upon his frail, little brown body. Make us remember that though we are glad to sing his glory today, we followed him not, nor did the things which he said. Had a few of us who honor him today shared the cross he bore, perhaps he need not have died.
Yea, O God, he hath borne our sorrows and by his pangs have we been healed. All we like sheep had gone astray, and he took upon himself the iniquities of us all, and this is the condemnation, that thy light came into our world, but we preferred our darkness.
Yet we know, O God, that Gandhiji is not dead. His spirit singeth still within our souls, and dwelleth on high with Thee in glorious brightness. And we too can turn again from the ways of hate and greed and war to the way of Thy Spirit We can repent us of our warlike madness and turn to the way of Thy forgiveness and love.
And as the little Father of India blessed his assassin, so would we forgive in his name all our enemies, all the sad and violent wanderers in the way of wickedness, all the unrepentant and criminal—so would we also sacrifice that love might dwell upon the weary face of earth.
And thus, O God, would we seek to follow the dear ones who have gone on to Thee in the way of brotherhood and righteousness and peace. Amen.
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